I Loved Her Like the Leaves
by Untamed Rosefire
Summary: Edward's thoughts as he mourns the loss of Bella. Based on the poem by Kakinonoto Hitomaro.
1. 1

Disclaimer: I do not own _Twilight_, or _I loved her like the leaves_. Some words from the poem may be tweaked slightly to fit.

"_I loved her like the leaves."_

It's autumn. The thought registers briefly in my mind that she died last autumn. It is a season of death, that much I have always known. I used to find a beauty of sorts in the golden brown hues to the trees as they slowly died in preparation for the winter. Autumn was always so alive with smells and sounds as leaves crunched underfoot and animals busied themselves with gathering food for the upcoming months.

Autumn is cold now. Cold and dead, like every other season, because she isn't here. But autumn is more special because it was _her_ season and every autumn that comes will mean another year without her. It was a time of birth too and for that I should be grateful but I cannot be because the death of my love overshadows anything and everything. How is it that the world keeps spinning, that people keep living, when she is gone? She was _everything_, yet so many never even knew of her existence, and do not know of how the world is surely worse off with her passing?

I leave only to hunt now, and today I feel the leaves crunching underfoot as they line the forest floor in a golden blanket. I used to enjoy the feeling, because although Autumn represented the death of so much life, it was also a time of new beginnings and a symbol that no matter what, life went on. Each leaf was a miracle of in its own right, wrought so finely and perfectly, once a provider of life and sustenance and now slowly fading away to a beautiful, intricate skeleton, it's final act being to nourish the tree from which it had fallen as it rotted.

In my youth, when I was still new to immortality, I once spent an entire year visiting the same tree every day, mesmerised by each and every single one of its leaves. They weren't particularly awe-inspiring to any passerby, but to me they were fascinating. The life that pulsated from them was so incredible, and their whispering in the breeze was music in its own right.

I have only ever encountered one other thing in my long existence which stole my breath in such a way, which projected such life and vibrancy. Her. Her very being promoted her fragility, and she reminded me of the leaves that I had studied so long ago. It was impossible not to be swept away by her, but I happily enjoyed the ride because she made my life have meaning, she made the sky bright and the morning unable to arrive fast enough. The leaves were a passing fancy when compared to her, and she eclipses anything else that I have ever encountered in all my years.

Now she is gone, what meaning does anything hold? What beauty is there to be found? The leaves aren't fascinating any more – they're just another reminder that everything dies, as my love did. Everything aches, and despite how simple life was in the days were I could watch the leaves and let time pass by without care I would not return to them. Because I have experienced passion and love and _Bella_ and life without her is no life at all.


	2. 2

"_The lush green leaves of spring that pulled down the willows on the bank's edge"_

Spring is here now, and time is like liquid in the way that it has passed so quickly. Everything is green and bursting with life. It is a bitter reminder that my love isn't here, that her light that burned so brightly has been extinguished. Where is the meaning in life without Bella? Why do the trees bother to bloom when she is not there to appreciate it?

Then and again, would she have appreciated it? A wry, broken smile comes to my face when I think of her mutterings in her sleep. Forks was too _green_ for her, too different from the place she called home. It was true; everything in Forks appeared to be green. It shone with life and she just amplified it with her very being there. I had always thought that she suited such a place, but it seemed that she missed the arid state of Arizona more with each passing day.

I can't decide if Autumn is cruller or Spring. Autumn is when she died; it reeks of death. But Spring embodies life, and that is all the more painful because life shouldn't exist without her – the lush green leaves can never hope to match up to her dazzling beauty, the way her every movement shone with life. All other life is a mockery of her existence, the world is a shell without her.

The need to hunt pulls me outside again, away from my sanctuary inside where I am able to shut out the light and pretend that the world actually did stop when her heart did, that time has not passed and she is still warm from her last breath though she is long gone. The satisfaction of the blood that sustains me is hollow because it is yet another reminder that all my kind do is take life, and she was just another casualty.

For one overwhelming moment I cannot bear to return to that oppressive house where my family tiptoe around me and the light does not exist, and I lean against the nearest tree I can find for support as I heave with tearless sobs. When I quieten and am able to look at my surroundings once more I am struck by the irony that the tree I am leaning against is a weeping willow. What is it weeping for, I wonder? Perhaps the willow knows of Bella's absence, perhaps it weeps with me that this world is so cold without her and it bends to kiss the ground in the hopes that prayer will return her.

I tried prayer, to begin with, but she wasn't returned to me. If there was anyone up there to hear my pleas, would they return her to me anyway? Myself, a soulless demon, that is the sole reason for her death in the first place? And why return her here to this world of pain anyway? The world is a worse off place without her, so by default is she in a better place because there she exists? There must be a heaven. She must exist there, because I refuse to believe that nothing but darkness awaited someone as holy and perfect as my Bella.


End file.
